Does a law have to have a valid reason?

[4thAmendmentLawyer]

Originally Posted by Double Naught Spy

I would argue that this is a loaded question (no pun intended). Going on the premise that lawmakers are inherently lazy as human beings, they would not go out of their way to arbitrarily makes laws. So when they make laws, they have reasons for doing so.

Now the question is, are the reasons valid? This is the loaded part because the answer is Yes and No. Pahoo touched on this more succinctly. Validity is a perspective. If you support the law, it has validity. If you don't support it, you aren't apt to claim it has validity. In fact, quite the opposite.

Pistolero cited an interesting example above and questioned why the number was 6. He could have raised several other questions as well as it is a convoluted law, but is it valid? Absolutely, at least from the perspective of the proponents at the time when they were trying to put the law into place. Is it invalid? Absolutely, at least from the perspective of anyone who wants to own more for reasons outside of the exceptions.

There is no law that I know of that requires lawmakers have reasons for passing laws where the reasons must meet or exceed some sort of validity standard. I seem to recall some passages (state laws?) stating that laws must be enacted for the 'good of the people' or some such language, but as a level of valid reasoning, that is so vague as to being virtually useless.

Theoretically, if a lawmaker perceives that there is a need (justified validity) for there to be a law and to sell that perception to fellow lawmakers, then a law will come about.

But that doesn't mean that that law will survive constitutional review. All laws must, at minimum have a rational basis. Laws passed out of animus (harming a group) typically lack a rational basis, as do laws enacted for protectionist reasons.

[101combatvet]

I call BS, but go ahead and believe that.